Shifting the bags she carried, Hermione managed to unlock the apartment's door, enter, and kick off her shoes before heading to the kitchen. She'd brought some staples with her - raiding the small pantry in her flat before her departure - but she'd wanted milk for their tea and fresh eggs for breakfast (which was a bit of wishful thinking as Charlie hadn't expected her to arrive a day early and she didn't know when he would be there.)

The thought of having breakfast with him caused a flutter in her stomach and she curbed her imaginative wanderings by tugging the change from her jeans' pocket, dropping the remaining ten Lei note and seventy-six bani onto the table as she continued into the u-shaped kitchen. The sound of settling coins accompanied the noise of retrieving the groceries from the two string bags she'd conjured earlier.

The kitchen was modern with clean lines and new appliances, and very quickly the counter between sink and cooktop was cluttered with half a dozen eggs, a quart of milk, fresh butter, a loaf of wholemeal bread, two bottles of Dorna mineral water, a semi-wilted bunch of spinach, and one perfectly ripe, fragrant tomato. Hermione eyed her purchases with a sense of accomplishment, even if her shopping trip had included more pointing and gesturing than it had actual speech.

She rinsed the tomato and refreshed the spinach, setting them in the second sink to drain and dry, before placing the dairy goods in the fridge, then padding bare-footed across the cool tile floor and into the cosy living area.

The sun had begun to descend into the western sky, its affectionate farewell a cascade of variegated bands of colour across the vista of blue. Hermione settled onto one of the plush chairs, and picked With Soaring Wings from the glass-topped coffee table. Staring at the broad, well-muscled back of the cover art, her eyes unfocused while she contemplated how much she'd revealed in her letters to Charlie, her fingers tracing the outline of the dragon tattoo without conscious direction. In her letters, she had been herself - her real self - and he had met her half-way . . . more than half-way actually.

She'd attempted to avoid thinking about their future, trying to keep her imagination in check until she and Charlie had actually seen one another with the intention of being more than friends. But anyone who knew her knew she planned in advance (colour-coded charts and all) and her mind had already travelled down new and exciting paths before she could put a stop to it.

Dropping the book onto the arm of the chair, Hermione closed her eyes. The last several days had been quite tiring, getting ready for her holiday and keeping her friends' curiosity at bay while reassuring them all that, yes, she knew what she was doing, and no, she didn't intended to use Charlie to scratch an itch.

She had left London in something like haste; her last stop before activating the Portkey had been to Gringotts to withdraw some funds, exchange galleons for Romanian currency, and to check the balance of her vault. A smile curved her lips and she thought of something Charlie had written in his last letter. No, this wouldn't be her last trip to Romania.

Lazily, her mind drifted from thought to thought.

Just as it was growing dark and she considered lighting some candles, there was a loud knock at the door. Hermione leapt to her feet, her heart racing, her palms instantly wet with nervous perspiration.

Charlie had come.

He was here.

She practically flew across the room, dodging past the loveseat and the foot of the stairs, and into the entry.

Another knock, louder than before.

Hermione reached for the doorknob, absently noting her trembling hand. Every single nerve ending tingled with expectancy.

She pulled the door open and laid her eyes on the man she'd dreamt of, on and off, for years and more consistently these past two weeks. His blue eyes blazed in his weather-beaten face, and his short ginger-coloured hair was tousled as if sweat had matted beneath a hat but his blunt-tipped fingers had made some effort to comb it into a semblance of respectability.

He stole her breath.

He was lean, as always. He wore a brown-and-tan plaid flannel shirt, hanging open over a rust-coloured tee shirt which matched the colour of his freckles. She briefly catalogued a missing button and a tear near the breast pocket of the flannel. Dropping her gaze, Hermione noticed how well his worn dragonhide trousers fitted, and further, that a dirt clod clung to the tip of one of his steel-capped boots.

Quickly she raised her eyes to look at his face; a spurt of pure, feminine pride flushed her cheeks as she watched him taking inventory. . . of her. His glance paused at her breasts and then grazed her hips before settling on her bare feet. A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, and she saw that the shadow of his beard added definition to his face, but also testified to the fact that he hadn't taken the time to shave.

Something about his unvoiced eagerness caused a prickle of moisture behind her eyelids, and she realised she hadn't blinked since opening the door.

"You going to let me in?" he asked dryly.

"Oh! Of course," she said, but didn't move because she had just seen the parchment he gripped in one fist. It was her letter. Her head snapped up and her eyes met his. "Oh, Charlie!"

"I didn't want to make you wait any longer." It was said lightly, yet there was a world of meaning behind the words.

She stepped back then. "I'm so glad."

When he crossed the threshold, he was within arms' length. He had obviously been working outdoors earlier because there was a charred smell mixed with masculine overtones of hard-working man. It was a heady fragrance. Charlie reached toward her with his empty hand, catching the hem of her shirt, fingering a small hole in the slightly tattered, turquoise tee. "Had this long?"

Hermione's eyes were fixed on his hand, watching him touch her clothing, wishing it were her skin. Her heart rate sped up and anticipation fluttered like a Snitch in her stomach. "Since the summer you told me it was your favourite colour."

His hand stilled, and when he spoke, his voice was huskier than she'd ever heard him speak. "That was years ago."

"I never believed you'd look at me twice. Remember, I wrote that I couldn't take the chance of letting my fancy develop .."

"Hermione--"

His tone demanded she look at him . . . and when their eyes met, she couldn't look away. She whispered, "I've half thought this was a dream these past few days, but you. . . you're here."

The parchment made no sound as it dropped to the floor, and neither Hermione nor Charlie noticed because he'd pulled her into his arms. Her hands slipped between layers of shirts, wrapping around his sides and spreading across his back. She inhaled deeply, memorising his scent.

He was here .

He'd meant everything he'd written.

After long minutes, Charlie relaxed his hold, but his calloused fingers snaked through her hair, dislodging her wand - they barely registered its clatter when it hit the tile floor - and angling her head until he could look deeply into her eyes. Something he saw must have satisfied his curiosity, because he smiled, and when he did, Hermione swallowed hard.

"I couldn't wait," he said, and then lowered his mouth to hers.

His lips were slightly chapped, a hazard of his career, and when his tongue snaked out to trace the seam of her lips, Hermione opened her mouth and flicked her tongue to taste him. Charlie groaned then, and before either of them knew it, she had pulled her arms from his back, wrapped them around his neck and her legs around his waist. Instinctively, he broadened his stance to accommodate her weight. Then they were kissing as if they were the first humans to discover how.

When Charlie staggered into the bathroom doorway, Hermione grunted as her shoulder blade connected with the wooden frame.

"Sorry," he muttered, his hands sliding around her thighs to hold her in place while he proceeded to kiss his way along her jaw.

"Don't be," she replied, arching her neck obligingly. He suckled the skin just below her ear and she shuddered, bucking her hips and moaning her encouragement.

Charlie gasped, breaking off his assault on her slender neck. "Hermione, I know we decided not to take it slow, but I didn't intend to shag you before I took off my boots!"

Her eyes were alight with mischief and desire, and she thought the flush of his cheeks was incredibly becoming. "Are you trifling with my affections?" she asked, reminding him of Baden Nott's comments in one of her early letters.

"You know I'm not," he replied; the timbre of his voice eliciting very intriguing reactions from her body.

"Neither am I. Don't you think seven years is enough foreplay?"

He chuckled. "Is that what we've been doing?"

By way of an answer, Hermione nipped the skin of his throat just above the collar of his shirt and then licked across his Adam's apple, feeling it bob as he swallowed. He bucked his hips and the distended ridge of his dragonhide-contained arousal rubbed against the crotch seam of her jeans.

She closed her eyes for a moment, gaining a modicum of control, and when she re-opened them, looking directly at him, his pupils were dilated with arousal, darkening their colour to a sapphire blue. "I wasn't teasing, Charlie. I want you."

Their letters had done the preliminary talking, now they allowed their actions to speak louder than any words. Hermione ripped another button from Charlie's shirt as she pulled it down and off his arms; in turn, he enlarged a hole in her tee when one of his fingers poked through it in his hurry to remove the soft cotton from her.

Eagerness sped suddenly awkward fingers, and Charlie cursed creatively when his pants tangled around his feet - having forgotten to take off his boots. However, within a scant two minutes, they were naked and lying on the hastily transfigured couch. With inarticulate murmurs of approval, Charlie positioned himself above Hermione, his body poised on the brink of their future.

"Are you certain?" he asked.

"I've never been more certain of anything," she replied while locking her ankles at the base of his spine.

He grinned roguishly, bucked his hips, and slid home.